[ Reminder ] The PBE is a testing ground for changes. What you see here may not reflect what you see in Patch Notes. Remember that developers want your feedback so if you disagree with a change, you can always submit your thoughts on the PBE Community Forums.

[ Note ] Hextech Crafting is back on the PBE for testing. You can find my gude on how the new system works HERE.

Mark of the Assassin [ Q ]

Triggering the mark now restores 40 energy at all ranks, increased fromÂ 20/25/30/35/40.

Shadow Dance [ R ]

Dash speed increased from 1600 to 2000.

Timewinder [ Q ]

Cooldown decreased fromÂ 11/10/9/8/7 seconds toÂ 9/8.5/8/7.5/7.

Barrel Roll [ Q ]

Slow duration is now always 2 seconds, regardless of how long the barrel was charged for (1.3 – 2 seconds on live).

Sweetheart Sona is now available to play on PBE! Please note that PBE content is still a work in progress! We always find bug reports and feedback super helpful, as well as constructive feedback, so feel free to comment in the thread below! Likewise, if youâ€™ve got any questions, post â€˜em here, and weâ€™ll do our best to answer them.

Heartseeker Orianna is now available to play on PBE! Please note that PBE content is still a work in progress! We always find bug reports and feedback super helpful, as well as constructive feedback, so feel free to comment in the thread below! Likewise, if youâ€™ve got any questions, post â€˜em here, and weâ€™ll do our best to answer them.

*Prices on PBE subject to change.

January 27th – We’re aware of an issue where Heartseeker Orianna’s recall is missing her props!

Once First Strike ends (9/15 23:59 PDT), new PROJECT skins will be deactivated in the League of Legends store until 9/17 to ensure that First Strike unlocks are redeemed properly. On 9/17 00:01 PDT, PROJECT: Fiora, PROJECT: Zed, PROJECT: Lucian, and PROJECT: Leona will be available for 975 RP until 9/24 23:59 PDT (and 1350 RP again after that).

Unlock custom spawn effects and PROJECT minions when you and your team equip PROJECT skins or wards for that game â€” only during 5.17 and 5.18!

Hereâ€™s how it works:

Optic Enhancer ward skin = 1 Sync Point

Each PROJECT skin = 2 Sync Points

If you start a game with 2 Sync Points, your team unlocks custom PROJECT spawn effects.

With 4 Sync Points, your team unlocks melee PROJECT minions as well as caster PROJECT minions.

PROJECT: Fiora will be available for 1350 RP from September 8th to 15th. If you purchase her during that period, you’ll also receive the exclusive load screen border previewed below. From September 17th to 24th, she’ll be on sale for 975 RP. After that, she’ll return to her regular price of 1350 RP.

PROJECT: LeonaÂ will be available for 1350 RP from September 8th to 15th. If you purchase her during that period, you’ll also receive the exclusive load screen border previewed below. From September 17th to 24th, she’ll be on sale for 975 RP. After that, she’ll return to her regular price of 1350 RP.

PROJECT: LucianÂ will be available for 1350 RP from September 8th to 15th. If you purchase him during that period, you’ll also receive the exclusive load screen border previewed below. From September 17th to 24th, he’ll be on sale for 975 RP. After that, he’ll return to his regular price of 1350 RP.

PROJECT: Master Yi is a legendary skin andÂ will always be priced atÂ 1820 RP. If you purchase the skinÂ from September 8th to 15th, you’ll also receive the exclusive load screen border previewed below.

Â

PROJECT: ZedÂ will be available for 1350 RP from September 8th to 15th. If you purchase him during that period, you’ll also receive the exclusive load screen border previewed below. From September 17th to 24th, he’ll be on sale for 975 RP. After that, he’ll return to his regular price of 1350 RP.

Â

This ward skin will be available in store for 640 RP after Patch 5.17 hits live.

These six PROJECT icons will accompany the skin releases at a price of 250 RP each.

Base Movement Speed decreased from 335 to 325

Â Conquering Sands [ Q ]

Enemies hit by multiple Sand Soldiers will have the duration of the spell’s slow refreshed, but won’t take any additional damage (additional soldiers deal 25% of their damage on live)

Caretaker’s ShrineÂ [ W ]

Mana costÂ decreased from 100/105/110/115/120Â to 90 at all ranks

Magical Journey [ E ]

Cooldown decreased fromÂ 20/19/18/17/16 secondsÂ to 18/17/16/15/14

Hemorrhage [ Passive ]

The passive bonus damage on 5 bleed stacks has been renamed from â€œBlood Rageâ€ to â€œNoxian Mightâ€

Crippling Â Strike [ W ]

Additionally, if Crippling Strike kills its target, the mana cost and 50% of the spellâ€™s cooldown is refunded

League of Draven [ Passive ]

If Draven kills 6 minions in a row without dropping an axe, he gains 2 extra Adoration stacks.

[ Reminder ] The PBE is a testing ground for changes. What you see here may not reflect what you see in Patch Notes. Remember that developers want your feedback so if you disagree with a change, you can always submit your thoughts on the PBE Community Forums.

Check out the Pool Party skins for Draven, Dr. Mundo, Lulu, Rekâ€™Sai and Zac!

[ Reminder ] The PBE is a testing ground for changes. What you see here may not reflect what you see in Patch Notes. Remember that developers want your feedback so if you disagree with a change, you can always submit your thoughts on the PBE Community Forums.

The changes to Face of the Mountain, Sweeping Lens and Warding Totem from the 12/06 PBE updateÂ have all been reverted. [Note, these were only tooltip, not functional changes, and they went out prematurely before the actual changes].

Hey everyone! Riot Reinboom here with context on an upcoming change to pathfinding.

The short of it: We’re rewriting a lot of the “stuck pathing” rules the game has in order to make the system more predictable and, when ‘stuck’, more forgiving. Ideally, helping alleviate a lot of the creep blocking pains.

This change will be on the PBE but will not be going out with next patch. Changing anything with pathfinding could have some serious feels unknowns that we would like to capture and understand first.

There are three major areas this change should touch.
1. What happens when a unit is actively on top of and sticking with another unit. If you’ve seen someone get stuck by Krugs or a ward this is a major part of it. The new rules should detect for overlaps better and let the champion walk away freely from their overlaps (effectively, a pseuo-ghost effect if your directly on top of something).
2. How units path between packs of units, like a large minion wave. The goal here is to make this more predictable. It should be more obvious why your champion may try to move through a group of minions or why they won’t try.
3. How units predict where they can go towards. For pathing, there’s some amount of look-ahead needed in order to make sure a unit isn’t moving towards an area they will soon be stuck in. Ideally, your character (and minions!) should be avoiding areas that will soon block them more so than on live.

We’re extra interested in any reports where you get stuck by a single unit anywhere on the map. Screenshots and videos super super useful if you do find any.

Any feedback about last hitting as a melee champion is also highly encouraged. 🙂

[ Reminder ]Â The PBE is a testing ground for changes. What you see here may not reflect what you see in Patch Notes. Remember that developers want your feedback so if you disagree with a change, you can always submit your thoughts on theÂ PBE Community Forums.

Over at Inven, Lead Designer Solcrushedhosted an AMA regarding Poppy’s rework, the state of some champions and his opinion on boobs. On the board forums, Meddlercommented on Irelia and Urgot’s upcoming gameplay updates and Riot’s progress at re-writing League’s code. To wrap up, a host of amazing cosplayersÂ in Lunar Revel attire.

I was in the Live Design team and now I am working night and day ruining your favorite characters in the Champion Update team. My current project is Poppy.

We are currently trying to transform Poppy into a tank instead of her current assassin role. We are trying to make her a feisty yordle who packs a big punch with her hammer and shield.

Poppy’s skillset makes her a champion that should NEVER get farmed. If Poppy becomes fotm after a VU we might even need to nerf her. A sion-level remake is planned for Poppy.

Poppy’s E, a tiny yordle smashing a giant champion to the wall is what makes her attractive.

Nope.

Quinn was designed to be a special ops champion so we are okay with her not being a good marksman, but we think that her commando side is lacking and requires buffs. Also when we remake ‘easy’ characters we try to maintain the difficulty.

I think we are going to wait a little before we make changes to Tristana. MF has a unique design and her winrate isn’t half bad so I don’t think she’s going to receive any changes soon.

Morde is going to receive some buffs but a remake is going to take a while. We think that Morde needs a giant remake to fix his problems.

I think he’s going to receive some more buffs

I am disappointed that we didn’t get to change Viktor’s ult, if we had a little more time we would’ve made changes to it.

We originally designed her to be a guerilla style ranger. An ADC that is able to provide everything she needs by herself.

We changed Fiddle’s Q and E because it’s design was flawed, it provided no counterplay to the opponents.

None at the moment, but I want to make some changes to him

It’s in its very early stages so we can’t really say anything about it.

I think Riven’s auto animation cancel gives players the sense that she takes skill to play so I think it’s okay.

There are a lot of factors that lead to a champion’s buff/nerf, but usually it is when

A champion has a ridiculously high/low winrate for no reason.

When we realize that our champion design was flawed

When it is dominating competitive games excessively

The crit component is an ancient mechanic, if Garen is going to receive changes I think that the crit component will receive changes first. Since it is hard for Garen to hit enemies in the back we want him to do enough damage to the champions in the frontline.

We have encountered a big obstacle in middle of the remake so we have put a pause on the project for now.

I don’t think TF is in need of a rework. The only skill that I think might need a change is his E.

The Game Systems dept is looking into it right now, personally even if the jungle is reverted to the season 2 state I think aggressive junglers will still be dominant. It has been proven from the top tier teams that the early level engages are very crucial to the outcome of the game so I think that there needs to be change to the jungle’s fundamentals rather than some changes to the jungle’s difficulty levels.

This is an issue even the developers have mixed opinions about. I personally think that Teleport’s effectiveness needs to be nerfed but some fundamental problems with top lane has been solved because of Teleport so I think that’s the reason the Game Systems team is being so cautious.

I think that the changes are made because our playerbase’s difficulty capacity has increased over the years.

There are some situations where we want skills to be reliable and easy to use so no

Penetration plays a major roll in the game’s overall pace and balance so it’s hard to make any changes to it atm, but if I were to make a new game I would probably make it an additional stat.

The Game Systems team is currently looking to make some changes to the jungle so that weak champions can clear camps easier early game.

Essence Reaver was designed to support crazy out-of-the-meta builds so I think it’s in a good state atm

We feel that we need to make a MR item that counters AP damage dealers, I suggested the idea to the game systems team and they had positive feelings about it.

We concluded that SOTD effects the game’s balance negatively so we removed the item.

We wanted Elixirs to be a game-deciding item but it’s not used as much so we are a little disappointed.

We also feel that a new UI for the summons is neededed but there’s just way too many things on our priority list so it’s hard to say when it will be coming.

It’s a funny story, I actually wanted to work in the Legal Affairs team but the design director approached me and asked if I wanted to work as a designer.

four

If you are working for the Play Testing team or the Live Balance team, yes.

One good thing about working at Riot is that we have a lot of freedom in performing ‘passion projects.’ Not all of our work has deep meanings behind them (…).

There were two season 4 challengers.

Boobs.

Here’s some official art by Aqua Moon: a concept for Underworld Wukong, spell icons for numerous champions and the different Ranked Leagues!

Some of the code’s updated or rewritten entirely every patch. Which bits depend on where we think there’s the most value (what features should be added, where do we see the most problematic or common bugs, are there ways to make the game run more efficiently etc).

As far as attack speed goes the cap’s not there for code reasons, but gameplay and animation ones. On the gameplay side having a cap allows you to take a maximum into account for balance reasons (what’s the absolute max Xin Zhao can reduce his CDs by for example). Animation wise it then gives a range of possible attack speeds that attacks need to be made to look good and feel right for (do attacks remain distinct, feel natural, read clearly etc).

Long term we’ve got a full rework planned for Urgot. That’s a long way off though, he’s both a big project and not first in the queue. Shorter term (starting next week) we’re going to explore some small, quick buffs for him. Hopefully find some stuff to help him out a bit in the meantime without reintroducing any of the problems that lead to him getting heavily nerfed in the first place.

We don’t have anything concrete on the gameplay side at the moment. She’s got a lot of potential we’d like to develop at some point, missed opportunities on the telekinetic blade side in particular as Ironstylus has mentioned. She’s in a reasonable spot balance wise right now though, and does have some really cool moments (Q chaining especially IMO), so other champs are higher priority for gameplay work right now.

Not counting early items (There was a time when actives didn’t exist in alpha, after all. Technically the first active probably was the hardest? Or maybe the first item at all)

Zz’Rot Portal is the most complex.

Some of the new tech in Zz’Rot:

The health bar. The minorest of it all. We couldn’t put a timer bar on structures before the void gate.

Unit tagging (arbitrary designation of “types” on a unit and in an inherited fashion)… in order to make:

AI behavior filtering based on tags. This is how Voidspawn ignores Void creatures and Champions (including clones).

“Gameplay” Navigation cell tagging. We had behaviored nav cells before (pathable, wall, stops vision, grants vision, brush…) but we didn’t have arbitrary tagging before that was exposed to our gameplay system. Nor did we have it when we released Zz’Rot (and instead I did some janky math to get it to assign lanes kind of correctly). We made that tech for first intent of making it so Zz’Rot’s spawn direction is sensible.

The moon is about to set on this yearâ€™s Lunar Revel, which means itâ€™s time to shine a lantern on the finest Lunar Revel, Blood Moon and Warring Kingdoms cosplay photos you guys submitted in response to our January call for entries. It was a joy to review all the submissions â€“ incredible work as always!

If you like what you see, donâ€™t forget to click on the cosplayersâ€™ names beneath their photos and tell them how much you enjoy their work.

Now starts gaining rage 15 seconds after transforming back into Mini Gnar, increased from 13

Barrel Roll [ Q ]

Slow strength increased fromÂ 30/35/40/45/50% toÂ 40/45/50/55/60%

Null SphereÂ [ Q ]

Base Damage decreasedÂ from 80/105/130/155/180 to 70/95/120/145/170

ElectricalÂ SurgeÂ [ W ]

Active can now be cast if a target is inside Slicing Maelstorm, even if the target doesn’t have a Mark of the Storm

Base HealthÂ increased from 482.36 to 497.6

Health-per-levelÂ decreasedÂ from 77 to 70

Base Attack DamageÂ increased from 50.04 to 52.04

Base Movement SpeedÂ increased from 325 to 330

Mana-per-secondÂ decreasedÂ from 1.8 to 1.6184

Mana-per-second per levelÂ increasedÂ from 0.08 to 0.13

Chain of Corruption [ R ]

Missile width increased from 100 to 120

Fairsight Orb [ Trinket ]

Now additionally places a visible ward at the target area that lasts 60 seconds

Greater Stealth Totem

Now stores up to two charges of wards. Regains a new charge every 60 seconds.

Oracle’s Lens

Price of upgrade decreased from 475 GoldÂ to 250

Spectre’s Cowl

Passive healing when hit increased from 100% of base HP regen to 150%

Lunar Revel is approaching; here’s a login screen to teaseÂ the upcoming event:

Zyra’s plants now have indicators for range. Below are both versions of her plants.

The Camera Move Speed option has been split into two options for both mouse and keyboard.

There are now two options for Locked Camera Mode: Fixed Offset and Per-side Offset. The former keeps the over-the-top perspective, while the Per-side offset aligns the camera “behind the shoulder” of the character, matching the camera angle for blue side and red side. Examples below:

Fixed Offset for Blue Side

Per-side Offset for Blue Side

Fixed Offset for Red Side

Per-side Offset forÂ Red Side

Classic Kennen

Deadly Kennen

Karate Kennen

Kennen M.D.

Swamp Master Kennen has also been updated, but I don’t have access to the skin. :/

Arctic Ops Kennen

Classic Fiddlesticks

Spectral Fiddlesticks

Bandito Fiddlesticks

Pumpkinhead Fiddlesticks

Fiddle Me Timbers

Surprise Party Fiddlesticks

Classic Veigar

White Mage Veigar

Veigar Greybeard

Leprechaun Veigar

Baron Von Veigar

Superb Villian Veigar

Lord MordekaiserÂ

Infernal Mordekaiser

The audio bug with Firecracker Jinx’s minigunÂ has been fixed.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask me atÂ @NoL_ChefoÂ or e-mail me at nolchefo@gmail.com.

[ Reminder ]Â The PBE is a testing ground for changes. What you see here may not reflect what you see in Patch Notes. Remember that developers want your feedback so if you disagree with a change, you can always submit your thoughts on theÂ PBE Community Forums.

All PBE updates for Patch 5.3 Cycle:

Inquisitor Sivir has received a color tweak to her waist cloth piece and her chest armor has beeen updated.

Old

New

Marauder Warwick has received tweaks to his armor and claws.

Old

New

Zyra’s plants now have indicators for range. Below are both versions of her plants.

There are now two options for Locked Camera Mode: Fixed Offset and Per-side Offset. The former keeps the over-the-top perspective, while the Per-side offset aligns the camera “behind the shoulder” of the character, matching the camera angle for blue side and red side. Examples below:

Fixed Offset for Blue Side

Per-side Offset for Blue Side

Fixed Offset for Red Side

Per-side Offset forÂ Red Side

Orb of Deception [ Q ]

Mana cost increased from 55/60/65/70/75 to 60/70/80/90/100

Fox FireÂ [ W ]

Base damage decreased from 50/80/110/140/170 to 40/65/90/115/140

Cooldown decreased from 9/8/7/6/5 seconds to 8/7/6/5/4

Range decreased from 750 to 600

Pale Cascade [ W ]

Orbs now rotate around Diana at double speed (faster shield proc)

Rage Gene [ Passive ]

Now starts gaining rage 15 seconds after transforming back into Mini Gnar, increased from 13

Barrel Roll [ Q ]

Slow strength increased fromÂ 30/35/40/45/50% toÂ 40/45/50/55/60%

Null SphereÂ [ Q ]

Base Damage decreasedÂ from 80/105/130/155/180 to 70/95/120/145/170

Nether Blade [ W ]

Passive magic damage on-hit changed from 20 at all ranks to 10/15/20/25/30

Chain of Corruption [ R ]

Missile width increased from 100 to 120

Fairsight Orb [ Trinket ]

Now additionally places a visible ward at the target area that lasts 60 seconds

Oracle’s Lens

Price of upgrade decreased from 475 GoldÂ to 250

Spectre’s Cowl

Passive healing when hit increased from 100% of base HP regen to 150%

If you have any questions, feel free to ask me atÂ @NoL_ChefoÂ or e-mail me at nolchefo@gmail.com.